An interdisciplinary approach to motivate students to learn digital systems and computing engineering

Abstract

We report a new learning approach in collaborative learning-by doing, real-world team-based project in two ICT courses: DigitalSystems and Computing Engineering, conducted at Universitat Polite`cnica de Catalunya. Data collected included: backgroundinformation on students; course evaluations; measures of the knowledge and cross-knowledge of both disciplines taken before andafter our SimulAVR project. SimulAVR integrates interdisciplinary knowledge by simulating via software a microcontroller and itsimplementation in VHDL. Our study is based on the analysis of the results of running the project for 3 years. After taking thesimulAVR project, the students rated the interest in both courses higher.